Unsupported Fanvil H5W - Custom template for wireless auto provisioning?

[NDGsystems]

Hi all,
we have a few older hotels where we'll replace the existing old Mitel system with 3CX.
Instead of pulling cat6 to each room, we want to go with Fanvil H5W (the wireless version).

I have two questions:
1. How to auto provision the phones to recognize and connect to the assigned SSID?
We can connect the phones to the wired network first, and let them adopt a template that includes the SSID information, if at all possible.
2. How do we make sure that in future updates the phones do not lose the Wi-Fi SSID information, which will require us to take them out of the room, and connect one by one using a wire again.
There will be over 800 phones using the WiFi, and losing the Wi-Fi information will be devastating for our bottom line.

Any help or experience will be highly appreciated!

Thank you.

 

[JohnS_3CX]

Hello,

While we do support the H5W, we only support when using wired LAN. This means that if you have issues with this grand deployment of over 800 phones, as a Partner you cannot go to 3CX Support for help because the phones will be deployed in an unsupported manner.

I realise that skipping CAT6 cabling sounds appealing and cost effective, but that's the bait for a serious trap. Allow me to explain in bullet points:

• You will have 800+ devices competing with everything else that uses WiFi and its respective operating frequencies
• Those devices cannot easily be logged on to WiFi in case they drop off, as opposed to LAN which works automatically upon network restoration
• Firmware upgrades will be a nightmare with the WiFi traffic and retransmissions that will generated
• If those devices have issues and need to be reset/reprovisioned you will have to do it manually per-phone by reconnecting each one to WiFi then entering your provisioning link
• Changes to your WiFi (which will need to be done at some point) will require you to reconnect all devices manually
• The audio quality and SIP reliability will not be as good as we've all come to expect from wired phones
• You cannot power-cycle your devices easily as you can with PoE switches in case you need to reboot them after the network goes down or for any other reason. PoE switches also mean that you don't need a power adapter for each device.
• You will not have the ability to use DHCP Option 66 to easily provision an imported list of MAC addresses, and also to have the phones automatically reprovision upon reset in case you need to troubleshoot one.

The CAT6 cabling cost and effort will only be done once, but it will pay off for at least a decade if not more, both for these phones and the next ones that replace them.. I think that if you deploy this right the first time round, you will have less headaches and support calls going forward. We do not test or support these devices over WiFi so we can't even warn you of any specific issues they may have, that will be for you to find out.